Nearly five years after the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Africa has emerged as a leading front in a U.S. military campaign to deny al Qaeda a new safe haven in the continent's vast, hard-to-govern regions.
Small groups of special forces, known as A-teams and often numbering less than a dozen soldiers, have begun traversing the hinterlands of more than a dozen countries in the Horn of Africa, the Sahel and Sahara regions.
Pentagon officials say the main aim is to help African governments from Sudan to Senegal and Nigeria train and equip local troops to combat Islamist militants in swathes of open country, already known as havens for smugglers and bandits.
Meanwhile, even smaller units of U.S. civil affairs troops have traveled to remote villages to dispense medical care, dig wells and build schools, hoping to make militancy less attractive...
Africa Key to Pentagon Counterterrorism Strategy
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